I spent some time yesterday with a bloke who ran a web design business that has built a great platform covering all the bases for a small business website, from brochure to feature rich online store. I can’t disclose the name of the business but there were a few things that impressed me about their approach and it wasn’t their technology.
Don’t get me wrong, their technology is great but it doesn’t set them apart from the multitude of businesses with mature web platforms like Adobe’s Business Catalyst, Yola, Weebly, Wix and BigCommerce. Their tech does all that you would expect a web publishing platform to do including forms, pages, galleries, email marketing, shopping carts, pricing levels, metrics and so on. The technology is fine, what sets them apart is their approach to the customer.
Everything is geared towards ensuring the customer has a delightful experience. Everything.
The proof of their success is that they have had only three cancellations in three years. Out of thousands of customers only three had been so unhappy that they have taken their business elsewhere. That is pretty goddam impressive.
So how do they do it?
Simple. They make the customer feel like the most important person in the relationship. This isn’t the typical relationship between the all knowing web dude and uninformed customer. It is a relationship where everything is structured so the customer gets a great result from their website from the pre-sales to well after launch.
They do this in two simple ways.
The first and most important way they make their customer feel like a star is by talking once every month for 45 minutes. This is included in every website price and let’s the customer know what is happening with their website, what they should be focussing on, and gives the a opportunity to ask questions and manage their online channel with the assistance of professionals eager to help.
This is superb customer service and the essence of being a social business. Do what makes your customers happy an nothing else!
The second way they approach their business differently is by documenting every process and I mean every process. Whether their staff are pitching a deal, servicing a customer, or managing a design brief everything is documented so their is no room for error. The customer will get the same service everything they interact regardless of the staff. Simple but very very effective.
What I recognised about this business is that their are no technology businesses only people businesses. Any business that becomes obsessed by the tech and forgets the customer is doomed to disappoint. The technology is simply an enabler to make customers lives easier. The next time a geek or techie goes on and on about tech remind them about who uses technology.
How could you approach your customers differently? Would a phone call once a month make them happy?